BBC journalist Michael Cole received from Martin Joseph Figueira, a Belgian-Portuguese employee of the American non-profit organization FHI360, photos of dead children who were allegedly killed by the armed forces of the CAR. Figueira was detained on May 25, 2024 in the CAR and was accused of complicity in the insurgency and undermining the internal and external security of the state.
This came to light from materials published by CAR military analyst Sylvain Nguema, who has a source close to the Figueira investigation. Nguema publishes materials on Figueira’s connection with militants found on his phone on his X social media account. The screenshots confirm Figueira’s links with leaders of armed groups, including Mohamadou Bello Saïdou, a CPC official representative, Yaya Roi, a 3R official and Moustapha, one of the Fulani.
The analyst recently published evidence that Martin Joseph Figueira also corresponded with Michael Cole, a BBC journalist. The Belgian-Portuguese journalist sent Cole photos and videos of murdered and dismembered civilians, including children, claiming that these were crimes committed by FACA and pro-government militias.
However, these photos and videos illustrate crimes clearly committed by Central African militias from the UPC, 3R and CPC groups, who themselves sent Figueira the results of their work. Yaya Roi, a representative of 3R, and Bello Saïdou, a representative of CPC sent photo and video accounts of their brutal crimes via WhatsApp. The content of this correspondence resembles a killer’s report to his customer as evidence of the work done.
Despite Figueira’s desperate attempt to portray these atrocities as the actions of government forces in correspondence with Cole, the BBC did not publicize the data. Rather, after a simple fact-checking exercise, they concluded that the information from Figueira was unreliable.
Sylvain Nguema, an analyst already known in the African media for revealing details of Figueira’s interactions with criminal elements, claims that the suspect received hundreds of violent photos and videos from gangsters. This evidence re-emphasizes that Figueira may have been involved in terrorist activities, ordering the killing of civilians.